anyone with a cap?

i just installed one but when i have the headlights on and the engine running, they still dim when the bass hits. its a 1farad and i thought it was supposed to be able to handle systems up to 1000w. anyone else having that problem??

capacitors aren't always the answer. the first thing i would do is upgrade the 3 main wire with 4 gauge wire. (fairly cheap thing to do) next i would check the battery. if it's too old, then get a new one (preferably deep cycle). then i would get a capacitor. sometimes biggest problem can be fix with the simplest solution.

will changing the wires make a big difference? i have 4g from the battery, split to 2-8g after the block.

and now im getting some interference when i first turn the HU on. while its playing and when i turn it off its ok. but the subs pop once when i turn it on. im not sure where its coming from, but no matter if i have the volume at 1 or 50, the pop is just as loud. how i wired it now works, but i know its not the best way. i didnt have connectors for 4g, so after the block i ran both 8g to the cap and then another pair of 8g to the amps. when i get a chance im gonna run a 4g in/out of the cap, and then to the block... and then out the the amps. but could that be causing the problem??

the wires i'm talking about is the wire from the alternator to the battery, the battery to the chassis, and the engine wire to the chassis. a lot of cars have 8 gauges only..:(

the turn-on pop is caused by the amp, so the volume of the HU would have no effect ..... trying staggering the turn-on of the amp. Caps only work with some cars, in some cases. Upgrading the battery to chassis and motor to chassis ground wires is relatively easy - but be careful of the alternator to battery wire, there is a sense wire in most cars connected to the alt output and the cars computer. In Honda's, a lowered voltage at idle is supposed increase motor RPM to keep the battery charged.

if all else fails...get a big rig. u won't see much dimming with one of those:D

well i never really payed much attention to the battery wires, but unless its just a lot of insulation, they are 4g.

what do you mean by "staggering" the turn-on?
and how is it that caps only work with some cars? isnt its purpose always the same? guess if its not helping i may as well take it out, although it does look pretty:D

and the wierd thing about that turnon pop, it just started today. i didnt touch anything having to do with the amps. all i did yesterday was change speakers, now its doing it. except on the way home tonight, it didnt pop. i wish these noises would be a little more damn consistant so i could figure out what was wrong.

Originally posted by strodda

and how is it that caps only work with some cars? isnt its purpose always the same? guess if its not helping i may as well take it out, although it does look pretty:D



it's purpose is always the same, but it doesn't mean it has to work with all cars. some cars demand more than others. just like medicines. advil's purpose is to relieve pain, but it may not relieve everyones pain. caps just works better with some cars than others.

the problem (in physics) is that because the amp doesn't draw a steady current, it's not really a DC drain (unlike, say, a set of fog lights that pulls a constant 15 amps or so) . Modern car amps have a DC-DC power supply. The 12 volts is taken in and put thru a "chopper" FET that converts it to a square wave (or nearly one). The width of the on pulse as compared to off pulse is varied as the power demand varies, this is known as pulse width modulation. What the battery sees as a "load" from the amp is really pulses at like 50-60KHz. Some cars electrical systems can handle this essentially AC load better than others - for some, the extra capacitance can even out the inductive load of an amp quite a bit and for others, and may not not do much of anything. If the cap has digital voltmeter stuff on it, the ESR (effective series resistance) becomes so high that cap cannot discharge it's stored charge into the system.

By staggering, I mean turning the amps, eq. crossovers, etc ... in a certain order. Sometimes, by letting a component stabilize first, you can eliminate a turn-on/turn-off pop.

Most factory cars come with 8-10 gauge power and ground cables to save on weight.